Op-ed | One Year into Trump 2.0: Domestic Instability and Foreign Policy Disruption

February 3, 2026

Over the past month, President Donald Trump has proven that he still has the capacity to shock the world. On 3 January, he ordered the US military to capture Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro. A few days later, he renewed his threats to forcibly annex Greenland. This prompted one of the most severe crises in the history of transatlantic relations – before Trump abruptly backed off in a speech at Davos. Trump then authorised a substantial military build-up to take place around Iran, in what may be a precursor to an attempt to overthrow the country’s government – or just another negotiating ploy.

At the same time, domestic tensions escalated sharply during what some have called the ‘Battle of Minneapolis’ – the most intense confrontation between the federal government and local citizens in modern American memory.^[1] The struggle eventually left two people dead and called into question whether the Trump administration could continue implementing its immigration agenda so aggressively.

In many ways, January 2026 has been a microcosm of Trump’s first year back in office. His foreign policy has been alternatively aggressive, flexible, and – to many allies – just plain confusing. Domestically, he has sought to implement a radical version of his nationalistic and frequently openly racist ‘Make America Great Again’ agenda. In doing so, Trump appears to have gone beyond what most of the public support, causing a huge electoral headache for his party ahead of the midterm elections later this year.

Domestic woes

Trump won the 2024 election extremely narrowly. His victory in the popular vote was by a margin of just 0.6%, 7.5 times smaller than Joe Biden’s margin in 2020.

Although this narrow victory was mostly driven by voter concern over high inflation, since his inauguration Trump has governed as if he had received a broad-based mandate to pursue a radical version of his MAGA agenda.^[2] He has attempted to persecute his political opponents and pursue a deportation campaign which has involved flagrant abuses of the rights of countless citizens and residents. When confronted by judges or disapproving members of Congress, he has branded their resistance as a betrayal.^[3] At every step, he has sought to sow division rather than unite the nation.

Americans do not appear to be enjoying the spectacle much. In a recent poll, Trump’s approval rating stood at just 37%, not far from its all-time low.^[4] Voters are particularly frustrated that the President has done little to reduce the cost of living, which remains extremely high.^[5] With Trump so unpopular, even members of his own party are becoming more willing to criticise him, and they only become more so as the midterms approach.

Trump’s signature domestic policy initiative of mass deportation has received the most attention. Over the past year, the White House has fundamentally changed how immigration enforcement works. Gone are targeted raids on known undocumented persons with criminal records. Instead, immigration agents have taken to aggressively patrolling urban areas, demanding to see the papers of anyone whose skin colour raises their suspicion. This campaign has involved violations of constitutional rights on a massive scale.^[6] It has been justified by openly racist rhetoric from Trump himself, who has referred to the members of some communities as “garbage” who come from “hellholes”.^[7]

Voters have been souring on Trump’s deportation campaign for some time, but events in Minneapolis over the past month led the dam to burst. For weeks, protesters in the city resisted attempts by immigration agents to arrest their neighbours, creating scenes that sapped support for the administration’s aggressive approach. After federal agents then killed two citizens – one a young mother, Renee Nicole Good, and the other a nurse at a veterans’ hospital, Alex Pretti – the nationwide backlash was extreme. In response, Trump removed Greg Bovino, the deputy in charge of the deportation campaign, and signalled a change of course. What comes next is unclear, but now even Trump’s signature domestic policy initiative is being challenged.

Foreign adventures

It is common for leaders who face frustration at home to instead look for achievements abroad. American presidents are remarkably free to chart their own course in foreign policy, with few formal requirements to consult Congress or civil servants. Trump has taken full advantage of this freedom, with the result that his foreign policy has been characterised by wild swings, ambitious goals, and little attention paid to practical implementation.

Perhaps the biggest change from Trump’s first term has been his increased comfort with using military force. Both the capture of Maduro and the bombing of Iran showed that Trump is now looking to the military to score quick wins. Even Greenland became the subject of explicit military threats, prompting alarm among NATO allies. In each and every case, what seems to be missing is any long-term plan for what happens after the military action or threat is over. It rarely seems like Trump is engaging in a rational calculation of means and ends.

The Greenland affair is a good example. Almost everything that Trump says he wants from Greenland – an increased military presence and mineral mining rights – could be accomplished with simple negotiations and no change of ownership. Instead, he threatened to seize the island outright, doing perhaps irreparable damage to the transatlantic alliance in the progress. He then retreated from his position, indicating that a negotiated arrangement within the existing territorial framework would suffice. All the damage, it seemed, was for nothing.^[8]

Another feature of Trump’s second-term foreign policy is its expansive scope. Trump is sometimes called an isolationist, but if he is then it is hard to explain why he took the time to try to broker peace between Thailand and Cambodia or Azerbaijan and Armenia. He often boasts that he has ended eight wars.^[9] Even if his real impact on these conflicts has usually been temporary and marginal, his desire to play global peacemaker is another sign that he is trying to rack up wins on the world stage. It may also be an attempt to distract from his failure to end the war in Ukraine.

Many European leaders entered the second Trump administration thinking that the main threat facing them was an American withdrawal. But over the last year, it has become increasingly apparent that the more immediate challenge may be something different: focused and hostile intervention in European affairs. From his threats to seize Greenland to his administration’s sustained criticism against European migration policy and liberal values, Trump seems to reshape Europe more than he wants to abandon it.

For Europeans, this is an uncomfortable and dangerous place to be in. Since the dawn of American global power a century or so ago, every region of the world except Europe has been subject to Washington’s capricious and often destructive power. The alliances and bonds of affection that seemed to shield Europe from these attentions are fraying, and it is natural for Europeans to wonder what awaits them.

It would be unwise for European leaders to assume that Trump’s domestic problems will constrain his international agenda. In fact, the harder things get at home, the more his gaze might shift abroad – with unpredictable consequences for us all.

Andrew Gawthorpe is a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Centre and a specialist in U.S. politics and foreign policy at Leiden University. He also writes a newsletter called America Explained.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this piece are those of the individual author and do not reflect the views of The Foreign Policy Centre.

[1] Ryan Cooper, The Battle of Minneapolis is Not Over, Prospect, January 2026, https://prospect.org/2026/01/29/ice-trump-minneapolis-alex-pretti-border-protection-kristi-noem-stephen-miller/

[2] Oxford Economics, Inflation was the Main Driver for Trump Victory, November 2024, https://www.oxfordeconomics.com/resource/inflation-was-the-main-driver-for-trump-victory/

[3] Kevin Frey and Mychael Schnell, Trump Suggests Some Democrats should be Hanged – and Some Republicans Rush to his Defence, MS NOW, November 2025, https://www.ms.now/news/trump-calls-democrats-seditious-traitors-republicans-rcna245028; Dan Maurer, ‘On Treason and Traitors’, Lawfare, June 2025, https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/on-treason-and-traitors

[4] Hannah Hartig and Jocelyn Kiley, Confidence in Trump Dips, and Fewer Now Say They Support his Policies and Plans, Pew Research, January 2026, https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2026/01/29/confidence-in-trump-dips-and-fewer-now-say-they-support-his-policies-and-plans/.

[5] Kathryn Palmer, How is Trump on Affordability? What Most Voters Said in New Poll, USA Today, January 2026, https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2026/01/22/trump-worse-affordability-new-poll/88302812007/

[6] Kyle Cheney, Judges Across the Country Rebuke ICE for Defying Court Orders, Politico, January 2026, https://www.politico.com/news/2026/01/30/ice-immigration-court-orders-00757894; Walter Olsen, In Minnesota, ICE is Assaulting the Constitutional Rights of Citizens, Cato Institute, January 2026, https://www.cato.org/blog/ice-versus-fourth-amendment

[7] Melissa Hellmann, Donald Trump in his Own Words – the Year in Racism and Misogyny, The Guardian, December 2025, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/29/donald-trump-racism-dei-misogyny-2025-review

[8] Katya Adler, Confronted over Greenland, Europe is Ditching its Softly-Softly Approach to Trump, BBC News, January 2026, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0lx7j1lrwro

[9] Jake Horton and Nike Beake, How Many Wars has President Trump Really Ended?, BBC News, October 2025, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5y3599gx4qo

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Op-ed | Patterns of History in Transatlantic Relations

Article by David Harley

January 30, 2026

Op-ed | Patterns of History in Transatlantic Relations

In this op-ed, David Harley, FPC Advisory Council member and former EU diplomat, offers an insider perspective on the historical continuities in US foreign policy and their implications for the future of transatlantic relations.

The slogan ‘America First’ has a long history. Often used by President Donald Trump, the phrase was first coined by President Woodrow Wilson during his 1916 presidential campaign, when he pledged to keep the United States (US) out of the First World War. The US nevertheless entered the war in April 1917. The non-intervention movement in America remained strong during the inter-war years, personified by the pro-Nazi stance taken by Joseph P. Kennedy, the US ambassador to the UK from 1938 to 1940 and father of John F. Kennedy.

Despite strong pleading from Winston Churchill, President Franklin Roosevelt would not commit the US to enter the Second World War after the start of hostilities in September 1939. It was only after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 that Congress, at Roosevelt’s bidding, unanimously voted to declare war. Six days later, in conditions of utmost secrecy, Churchill set sail for America in the battleship Duke of York. At Roosevelt’s invitation, he was to stay for three weeks in the White House: from their conversations, often until long into the night, the special relationship was born and an alliance forged with the ultimate goal of defeating Nazi Germany and restoring freedom to Western Europe.

Transatlantic relations today are, in many respects, very different, yet with certain similarities. Trump 2.0 and the machinations of the President himself represent and greatly accentuate a deep-seated historical trend of US foreign policy. Once again, Britain and Europe are under threat of war, this time from Russia, but Trump is clearly no Roosevelt, and clear, decisive leadership on the European side is notably absent. Moreover the scourge of populist nationalism is on the rise, on both sides of the Atlantic. The strong likelihood is that the US under President Trump will disengage from Europe and NATO.

Not since the Suez crisis in 1956 has an American president treated Britain with such disdain as the current incumbent. A particularly low point was reached by Trump’s remarks at Davos regarding British soldiers who lost their lives in Afghanistan. These comments have intensified concerns about the future of the transatlantic partnership. The British government now faces an urgent strategic question: how did the UK reach this position, and what should its next course of action be? The current British government’s line of refusing to choose between the US and the EU is becoming increasingly less tenable.

As a senior EU official, I witnessed at first hand, at various meetings in Washington and New York, the continued trend of ruthlessly promoting American interests as they defined them. This was evident both under President Clinton and President George W. Bush. In the case of Iraq, both administrations used unproven allegations of WMD (weapons of mass destruction) held by Sadam Hussein as justification for first bombing and then waging war. The Blair government seemed to swallow the American line unquestioningly.

President Trump’s recently stated objective of taking over Venezuela’s oil reserves echoes words spoken by Vice-President Dick Cheney at a meeting I attended at the White House in July 2002. Cheney made clear that the primary US concern about Iraq was that ‘Saddam is sitting on 10% of the world’s oil reserves, which it cannot allow to fall into the hands of a rogue state or a murderous dictator who refuses to cooperate with the international community’. At the time, Cheney had recently served as CEO of the oil and gas company Haliburton (1995-2000), and as Vice-President he still retained significant stock options.

At a meeting later that day with Condoleezza Rice, national security adviser to President Bush, she began with a little joke that policy differences between Europe and the US had always existed, ever since American independence and even to the burning of the White House by British Forces in 1814. She went on to state forcefully the US’s ‘profound reservations’ about ever submitting to judgments of the International Criminal Court. Rice made it abundantly clear that the US would only recognise or cooperate with international institutions ‘such as the UN or even the EU if and when it served their national interest’.

Although Britain backed the Bush administration over Iraq, other political leaders in mainland Europe were not blind to these long-standing features of US foreign policy and took a very different view. During a lunch I attended in June 2003 at the Élysée Palace, President Jacques Chirac launched into a furious diatribe against US policy. I discreetly noted down the President’s words as follows: ‘Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, Europe has no longer been strategically important for the US. The Balkans conflict masked this change. The main objective of US foreign policy is to break up Europe.’

If Chirac’s analysis may have sounded exaggerated at the time, over 20 years later his words have proved prescient. The warnings from the patterns of history were there but we – Britain and Europe – chose to ignore them. We must hope that it is not too late to change course as we face the dual threat of Russian expansion and American withdrawal. As Mark Carney memorably said earlier this month in Davos ‘nostalgia is not a strategy.’ In today’s turbulent times, nor is the special relationship.

David Harley is a former EU diplomat, political communications consultant, and author. Posts held include Deputy Secretary-General of the European Parliament and Senior Advisor at the Brussels public affairs agency Burson Cohn & Wolfe. He holds a degree in Modern Languages from the University of Cambridge and a Diploma in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia. In 2021 David published the transcription of his political diaries in ‘ Matters of Record – Inside European Politics’ and in 2022 co-edited ‘The Forgotten Tribe – British MEPs 1979-2020’. He is currently a member of the Foreign Policy Centre’s Advisory Board, and is a regular speaker and commentator on UK-EU relations.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this piece are those of the individual author and do not reflect the views of The Foreign Policy Centre.

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Op-ed | One Year into Trump 2.0: Domestic Instability and Foreign Policy Disruption

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